voice, and dew-dripped lilies dim to her brow. But I shut my dazzled
eyes at first from these, and strove to see only the face whereon, with
tender kisses, I had sealed my future--having narrow aims; till the
vision faded despairingly, and even closed lids would not recall it, and
my weak resistance seemed but to strengthen the sway that bore me
willingly away.

Over and over I told the rosary of Aspiro's charms. Hour by hour I
wearied not of her perfections. With burning vows and rapturous words I
pledged my life to her.

Once when the wind was sweeping her gay garments, like hope-banners,
against my limbs, and tangling her long, loose hair about me--once when
I was blind with the jewel-dazzle from her breast, thrilled by the
passion-pressure of her hand, she said, in saddest, sweetest tones:

'I am erratic, Paulo, and exacting--will you tire of me!'

O Immortality! Did not that seem sacrilege!


Like curlew's wings flapped the white sails of the ship on the blue
waters. Aspiro's eyes absorbed my mind and memory. The past was
voiceless--the future clarion-toned. So we loosed our hold of the real
past, and drifted toward an ideal future.


We wandered through apocalyptic mazes, startling the hush of mystery
with daring footsteps. We brake the bread of the cosmic sacrament in
sight of the Inaccessible.